This property has a documented history as a property with a heating oil tank going back to 1929. Historical insurance policies issued during those prior operations and through 1986 could recover the cleanup costs already paid.
This office building at 200 SW Michigan Street was constructed in 1929, with a building addition in 1940 and a Sonic Test Building operating on the property from the mid-1960s to the late 1970s. A 3,000-gallon fuel oil UST and a 1,000-gallon diesel fuel UST — implied to have been installed by 1973 — were excavated and removed in 1998, along with contaminated soil and 110 gallons of impacted groundwater recovered by vacuum truck. TPH-DRO concentrations in soil and groundwater surrounding the diesel UST exceeded the Method A Cleanup Standard. An Independent Remedial Action report in 2014 confirmed No Further Action status under the Voluntary Cleanup Program. That history could support an insurance cost recovery claim against carriers who issued insurance policies 40+ years ago.
Why Historical Insurance Policies May Be Accessible
Pre-1986 Commercial General Liability (CGL) policies were occurrence-based and did not contain an effective pollution exclusion in Washington. If contamination occurred while those policies were active, those historical insurance carriers may still have a legal obligation to fund the cleanup costs, even if the business closed or the property changed hands.
The fuel oil and diesel USTs at this property were in service by at least the early 1970s — well within the era when occurrence-based CGL policies carried no effective pollution exclusion. The documented remediation costs here — UST excavation and removal, contaminated soil disposal, groundwater recovery, and the multi-year investigation culminating in the 2014 Independent Remedial Action report — are expenditures tied directly to releases from those pre-1986 fuel storage systems. Historical carriers who provided coverage during the decades the tanks were in operation may still be obligated to reimburse those cleanup costs.
Restorical's role is to locate viable historical policies, determine whether a successful cost recovery claim is possible, and assist our clients and their legal counsel to obtain insurance coverage for costs already incurred. Restorical's forensic accounting team works to re-establish and document past cleanup expenditures, ensuring the strongest possible basis for recovery.
Recovering Costs from an Older Cleanup
If this site reached No Further Action years ago, the original cleanup expenditures may be difficult to reconstruct. Restorical's forensic accounting team specializes in re-establishing and documenting past cleanup costs — even decades later — to build the strongest possible basis for an insurance recovery claim.
What We Look For
- Historical insurance policies (pre-1986)
- Policy numbers, carrier names, and coverage periods
- Connection between contamination timing and policy period
- Evidence linking cleanup obligation to insured activity
What We Deliver
- Historical Coverage Chart
- Trigger Analysis & Property/Policy Nexus
- Coverage strategy with recommendations
- Insurance funding for your remediation
- Claims Management & Forensic Accounting
The Restorical Proven Process
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Contact UsThis analysis is preliminary and based on publicly available records. Restorical Research is not a law firm and does not provide legal advice.
